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Cabbage and Carrot Salad
Mix 2 cups shredded cabbage with 1/2 cup grated carrot and 1 apple cut in dice. Serve in nests of Lettuce or cabbage leaves with Thousand Island French Dressing.
A straightforward raw slaw from a 1920s luncheon menu, needing little more than a note on proportions and the dressing it depends on.
- YieldAs written this makes four modest side portions, or two if it is the main salad course. It doubles without adjustment.
- Shredding the cabbage"Shredded" here means finely cut with a knife, not the coarse chunks a food processor produces. Quarter the head, core it, and slice across the grain as thinly as you can; thin shreds take up dressing instead of sitting under it.
- The apple is the hingeDiced apple browns within minutes of cutting. Dice it last and toss it in the dressing immediately, or hold it in water with a squeeze of lemon while you work.
- Choice of appleA firm tart variety holds its shape and balances the sweetness of the carrot. The recipe says only 'cut in dice' and does not specify whether to pare it; leaving the skin on adds colour.
- Thousand Island French DressingThe name points to a cross-reference elsewhere in the book; follow that recipe if you have it. Period versions under this name were generally built on an oil-and-vinegar French dressing with chili sauce or ketchup stirred in, thinner and sharper than the mayonnaise-based bottled Thousand Island sold now; a vinaigrette with a spoonful of chili sauce comes closer.
- Nests of lettuceUse whole cupped leaves from the heart of an iceberg or butterhead. Chill them and dry them thoroughly, or they will slump under the dressing before the plates reach the table.
- TimingDress at the last moment. Cabbage salted or dressed in advance weeps and the salad loses its crispness within half an hour.
This belongs to the era when American cookbooks were teaching raw vegetables as a virtue rather than a novelty. Shredded raw cabbage salads had long been standard, but the 1910s and 1920s brought a wave of interest in "uncooked" foods driven by the new science of vitamins, and grated carrot in particular turns up again and again in menu books of the period as a way to add colour and freshness to a plate. Serving the mixture in a cupped lettuce or cabbage leaf, rather than heaped in a bowl, was a common presentation for a ladies' luncheon course: it portioned the salad neatly, needed no serving spoon at the table, and made a small quantity look composed.